It's Bath Time!
by Daughterof8
Summary: "...I'm going to give you your bath." See what happens when Trixie gets sick and Jim is in charge of giving their three-year-old son a bath.


"All right, Dillon, let's give you your bath," Jim Frayne said to his newly-turned-three-year-old son as he scooped him up.

"Daddy, why can't Mommy give me a bath? She's the one who usually gives me my baths," Dillon informed his father.

"Your mommy isn't feeling very well right now," Jim told him. He frowned slightly. "She's sick, so I'm going to give you your bath."

Dillon looked at him doubtfully. "You are?"

"Yes. I've given you a bath before."

"But, Daddy, Mommy usually does it. And she helps you when you do it. And you can't do it without her. And…"

Jim was slightly offended that his young son thought that he couldn't give him a simple bath. "Well, I'm sure we'll be fine."

"Okay," the boy replied dubiously.

Jim headed up the stairs and into the larger bathroom in their house. He set Dillon down and looked around. "Of course, usually when I give you a bath, your mom has everything set out already," he muttered to himself. To Dillon he asked, "Where does Mommy usually keep your soap?"

Dillon frowned for a moment, and then he wandered over to the bathtub. "Up there, I think," he said uncertainly as he pointed to a shelf in the shower.

Jim walked over to him and glanced at the shelf. It seemed that Dillon was right, since on the shelf there was a blue bottle that said body wash. "Okay." He hesitated. "Well, go ahead and take off your clothes while I start the water."

Jim turned his back on his son and reached for the handle to turn the water on. He turned it about to where he normally had it for his showers, and then turned back to Dillon. He blinked when he saw that he was still fully dressed. "Dill, I thought you were going to take off your clothes."

"Mommy says I should go to the bathroom before taking off my clothes," Dillon said, looking at his father with his bright green eyes.

"Oh, right," Jim replied, getting slightly distracted at the mention of his sick wife. He wondered if she was feeling any better yet. "Well, then you can go."

"Daddy!"

"What?"

"I need you to help me with the snaps on my pants," Dillon said impatiently. "I can't do it myself."

"Oh. Right. I knew that," Jim mumbled. He quickly helped Dillon go to the bathroom, and then he said, "Okay, buddy, let's take off your clothes now." Jim started to pull Dillon's shirt over his head.

Dillon gave him a look and pulled back. "Daddy, I can undress myself."

Jim blinked. "Okay. Go ahead and take off your clothes, then."

Dillon quickly undressed himself. "Okay, Daddy."

"Great. Now, let me check the water..." Jim leaned over the side of the bathtub to test the temperature of the water, but Dillon, being Dillon, was too impatient to wait for his dad. He climbed into the bathtub, but then immediately jumped up.

"Ow, Daddy, that's hot!" Dillon looked like he was about to start crying.

"Oh, sorry, buddy. Let me get it cooler." Jim pulled him out of the tub and stood him on the bathmat while he turned the handle to cold water.

"Mommy says that it has to be colder for me than it is for her and you," Dillon informed him. "Mommy says it's 'cause I have more sensive skin."

"Sensive?" Jim repeated. "Oh. Sensitive. Well, your mommy is right about that."

"Mommy says that she's right about a lot of things."

Jim coughed at that remark. "I see."

Dillon was silent for a moment. Then, "Daddy, will Mommy be better tomorrow?"

Jim hesitated. "She might. I don't really know."

"Why not? You know everything."

Jim smiled. "Thanks for the compliment, Dill, but I don't know everything."

"Oh. So you don't know if Mommy will be better tomorrow?"

"No, I don't." Jim glanced toward the tub. "The water's probably cool enough now. Ready to get back in the tub?"

"Uh-huh."

Once Dillon was in the tub, Jim leaned back against the tub with a sigh. He had barely begun the bath and already he was wishing that Trixie wasn't sick. With that thought, he began wondering – again – how Trixie was doing. Now that he thought about it, she hadn't really felt one hundred percent well for quite some time. It seemed that she was always tired…

"Daddy, what are you doing?"

"What do you mean, what am I doing? I'm sitting here."

"Mommy says we have to wash me when I have a bath," Dillon said. "She washes my hair and my arms and my legs and my tummy and–"

"Okay, I get it," Jim interrupted him. "Your mommy makes sure to wash you very well. What does she wash first?"

"My hair."

"Okay, then." Jim sprinkled some water over Dillon's silky curls, but then he got distracted as he thought of Trixie's curls and wondered, once again, if she was feeling better. He absentmindedly reached for the bottle of body wash and squirted some of it in Dillon's hair. He rubbed it in well and then frowned, realizing that he couldn't really sprinkle water over Dillon's head to rinse the soap out of his curls. "Dill, how does your mommy get the soap out of your hair?"

Dillon glanced up from his bath toys. "She takes a cup and dumps water all over me."

"Right, right. I remember now." Jim glanced around and his eyes lit on the glass cup that they had near the sink. He grabbed it and rinsed Dillon's hair with it.

"Mommy doesn't use that cup. Mommy uses a blue cup."

Jim took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "I'm not your mommy, Dillon. I used a different cup than she usually does, and it was just fine."

"Okay, Daddy. Now you have to clean my arms and legs and tummy and the rest of me. But I can clean my toes – Mommy said so."

"Okay, Dill." Jim obliged and used the soap to clean his son's body. When he was done he asked, "Now, does your mommy usually do anything else?"

Dillon frowned thoughtfully. "No. But she usually plays with my toys until it's time to get out."

"Okay." Jim nodded and picked up a rubber ducky. "How do you usually play?"

Dillon gave him a disdainful look. "Mommy is _never _Mr. Ducky. She's always Miss Whale," Dillon told him, handing a dark blue whale to his father.

Jim stifled a sigh. "All right, I'll be Miss Whale."

Father and son played together in tub for a while. Finally Jim leaned back and said, "Well, Dill, I think I'd better get you out of there before you get all pruny."

"Pruny? What's that?" Dillon looked up at Jim.

"It means that your skin gets all wrinkled," Jim explained. "And we don't want that to happen to you. So let's get you out, buddy."

After Jim had lifted Dillon out of the tub and set him on the bathmat, Dillon frowned and looked at his father. "Daddy, Mommy always has a towel laid out before she takes me out. Otherwise she says that I'll get water all over the place."

"Oops," Jim muttered while he got up and grabbed a towel from the closet. "I kind of forgot about that part."

"Not _that _towel, Daddy," Dillon told him. "That one's purple. Mommy always uses the blue towel for me."

Jim just nodded and got a different towel. Once Dillon was dried and dressed, Jim hung the towel over the shower curtain rod and bent down to let the water out.

"Wait, Daddy!" Dillon cried. "Mommy always lets me do that!"

"Okay, buddy, go ahead and let it out." Jim made sure to keep a close eye on his son as he leaned over the edge of the tub and unplugged the drain.

"All right. Is there anything else that has to be done?" Jim asked Dillon.

Dillon shook his head. "Nope. Can I go see Mommy?"

"We can both go see Mommy and see if she's awake and feeling better," Jim said. He rubbed his temple, feeling a headache coming on.

"Yay!" Dillon was out of the bathroom almost before Jim could blink. He shook his head and followed his son.

By the time Jim made it into his and Trixie's bedroom, Dillon was on the bed next to Trixie and was chattering excitedly. "...and the water too hot and it burned my bottom and legs, but then he switched the handle thingy to cold water and made it all warm and then he sat right down without washing me so I had to tell him that you say that I have to be washed and then he took–"

"Sounds like you and Daddy had a fun time," Trixie interrupted him gently, shooting an amused look at Jim.

"Yeah, it was fun all right," Jim mumbled.

"Dillon, how about you go find your new book and I'll read it to you?" Trixie suggested. "I'm feeling much better now."

"Okay, Mommy." Dillon scrambled off of the bed and raced out the door to search for his newest book.

Jim walked over to the bed and sat down beside Trixie with a sigh. "I am never going to give him a bath again," Jim muttered with his eyes closed. "From now on, if you get sick, I'm either calling Honey to give him a bath, or else waiting until you're better."

"That bad, huh?" Trixie said with a slight smile as she cuddled up beside him.

"It really wasn't that horrible...except I kept getting distracted by thoughts of you, so I kept screwing up. I heard 'Mommy says this' and 'Mommy always does that' enough to last me a lifetime." Jim slipped an arm around her shoulders.

"At least we know he pays attention," Trixie smirked.

"Uh-huh."

"Say, Jim, what did you use to wash Dillon's hair?" Trixie asked after a few moments of silence.

"I used the blue– oh, crap," Jim moaned. "I used the body wash instead of shampoo to wash his hair."

"I thought so. Well, his hair isn't any worse for the wear. It should be okay, as long as you don't do it all the time."

"I won't. And how did you know that I didn't use his normal shampoo, anyway?"

"His hair smelled like the body wash," Trixie answered while she played with the buttons on his shirt.

"Oh." Jim suddenly seemed to realize that he was cuddled up with his sick wife. "Uh, Trix? I haven't gotten the flu yet this season. And if I cuddle with you, I'm almost sure to get it."

"This ain't the kind of flu that _you _can get," Trixie said under her breath. Then she grinned cockily at him. "Too bad for you."

Jim hadn't heard his wife's first comment. "Thanks a lot."

"Hey, Dillon doesn't have any problem being near me when I'm sick," Trixie pointed out. "Besides, I don't exactly see you moving away from me."

"Yeah, but he's a kid. If he gets sick, he'll get juice and lots of attention. If I get sick, well, nothing good comes from it," Jim grumbled. He ignored her second comment, as he knew she had a point. Then he grinned sheepishly. "Speaking of being sick...are you feeling any better?"

"Took you long enough to ask," Trixie said with a twinkle in her eye.

"Hey, I was recovering from giving our son a bath," Jim defended himself. "Anyway, _are _you any better?"

Trixie nodded. "It was mostly just this morning that I was feeling pretty bad." She hesitated. "Jim, about this being sick thing...there's something you need to know. I, uh–"

Before she could finish her sentence, they heard the pattering of little footsteps come back. Trixie shrugged. "I'll tell you later," she murmured to Jim. He nodded. He had an idea of what she was going to tell him, anyway. She had exhibited such symptoms not too long ago.

He looked up as his son entered the room once more. "Mommy, I couldn't find my new book. But I got this one instead," Dillon said, holding up _Blue Train, Green Train._

"Okay, sweetheart." Trixie helped him climb up onto the bed. With a glance and smile at her husband, she began reading to Dillon.

Jim leaned back against the headboard of the bed and slipped an arm around his wife. He smiled as she leaned back against him, and his smile widened into a grin at the thought of things to come.

_**Author's Notes**_

**Disclaimer: I don't own any of Random House characters, nor am I making any profit off of them. However, I do own Dillon, for which I am grateful. He's simply adorable :)**

**Regarding Jim using the body wash for Dillon's hair – when I googled it, I found that people don't exactly recommend it, as it may dry out the scalp, but it shouldn't hurt in the long run. Plus, a few people *cough cough my editors cough cough* confirmed that it shouldn't hurt, especially for only the one time. **

_**Blue Train, Green Train **_**is a book about Thomas the Tank Engine. I don't own it, and I'm not making any profit off of its use, either.**

**This story was inspired by pictures #2 and #10 for CWE #3 on Jix. Picture #2 (a drop of water) gave me the idea for having a bath, and picture #10 (a baby) is related to the not-so-subtle hints that I dropped about...things. *grin* The final word count came in at 2101.**

**This story of part of a continuing universe about the Bob-Whites, their lives, and their children. This particular story takes place pretty far into the future, but it's still a little while before "'Splorin' at the Beach."  
**

**Thanks sooo much to my editors – Jo, Joycey, Pam, and Jenny, you all make my writing so much better! Though since I was in a hurry to get this posted before the CWE #3 deadline and I revised quite a bit after I got it back from them, it's probably not top quality. Any and all mistakes are mine and only mine.**

**And, of course, thank you to all who read this story!**


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